This application relates to the art of coating compositions and to method for providing surfaces with coatings. The invention is particularly applicable to ultra thin films formed by amphiphilic molecules, and will be described with specific reference thereto. However, it will be appreciated that certain features of the invention have broader aspects, and may be used with other types of film forming substances and coating compositions.
Compositions having ingredients that are capable of forming thin films on substrates are discussed in an article entitled Oleophobic Monolayers, by W. C. Bigelow et al., J. Colloid Sci. I, pages 513-538 (1964); in an article entitled Wettability and Conformation of Reactive Polysiloxanes, by Lieng-Huang Lee, Journal of Colloid and Interface Science, Vol. 27, No. 4, August 1968, pages 751-760; in n article entitled Electrical Conduction Through Adsorbed Monolayers, by E. E. Polymeropoulos et al., J. Chem. Phys. 69(5), Sep. 1, 1978, pages 1836-1847; and in U.S. Pat. No. 4,539,061 issued Sep. 3, 1985, to Jacob Sagiv, for a Process for the Production of Built-Up Films by the Stepwise Adsorption of Individual Monolayers. The disclosures of which are hereby incorporated herein by reference. These compositions use thin solvents in which a film forming substance is soluble. In general, the solvents are toxic and environmentally unsafe. Highly liquid compositions also lose their usefulness very rapidly when exposed to airborne moisture and/or oxygen. Highly reactive material tend to form molecular agglomerations and precipitated out of solution.
It would be desirable to have a film forming composition that is not noxious or hazardous to persons or the environment, and that would provide optimum protection and stability for a film forming substance in the composition. At the same time, it would be desirable to provide such a composition that is easily applied to substrate surfaces to form a substantially continuous ultra thin film of substantially uniform thickness thereon.